Absolutely another slam dunk in the genre of sad girl lit fic, i gobbled this up greedily and readily. This is a story of Max, a trans woman navigating the end of her 20s into the odd responsibility after such a hot mess phase of your life, and her new boyfriend Vincent, a man who lived said 20s the hottest mess of them all. Both have had experiences where they have made mistakes, and as you read you learn how said mistakes both shaped them in years prior and affect the other in modern day.

Disappoint Me doesn't just focus on the romantic relationship between Max and Vincent, but also the complicated bonds of family and the waxing./waning nature of friendship. All of the characters, from the main pair to the side characters making frequent appearances, are so well and thoroughly formed. I could believe any of them were real people walking around in every day life, there are no extremes that exist only in the realm of fiction in Dinan's work.

Thank youNetGalley and the publisher for this arc in exchange for my honest review!

While I enjoyed the concept of this book, I felt like it did not do much the entire time. I didn’t hate it but it felt like it was lacking something. Thank you for the arc

4.5/5

Oh, where to start. This was a beautiful, introspective look into the mind of a trans woman, Max, and her new boyfriend, Vincent. Disappoint Me follows their relationship from inside both Max and Vincent’s heads as we learn more about their motivations and the baggage they bring into the relationship.

I really loved the writing in this, especially Max’s POV. I loved the way her mind worked and the way she analyzed her experiences. She’s not perfect, she’s often self-deprecating and focused on other’s perceptions of her, but I felt more connected to her because of it. I liked Vincent’s POVs less than I liked Max’s but his were still intriguing and interesting since you’re trying to figure out why we’re even in his head during a different time period.

The only reason I wouldn’t give this 5/5 is because I, personally, don’t feel as if it re-wrote my neural pathways which is what books that I give 5/5 tend to do. However, this was still extremely good and such a worthwhile read.

Both laugh-out-loud funny and very difficult to read at different times; such a smart, specific, interesting voice. I will be recommending this to others.

This was such a beautiful book, and unlike anything I've read. Bouncing between two people in a new relationship, and through time, we follow Max, a trans woman who has just started dating Vincent, a corporate lawyer whose story of his gap year in Thailand 10 years earlier we hear in tandem with the story of their budding relationship in the present.

Since I grew up in Thailand, I especially loved those chapters and Dinan does an amazing job of making you feel like you are there through her rich writing and incredible storytelling. Max, in 2024, is a fantastic character. She is reeling from a breakup and while we think a first online date with Vincent doesn't have any potential at first, watching their relationship bloom and proving us wrong is delightful, but often sad, and ultimately romantic. I really enjoyed this book and took my time with it because of Dinan's great writing and world building.

Thank you NetGalley and Random House for this ARC of Disappoint Me by Nicola Dinan.

This was beautifully written, and easily one of my top reads so far of the year. The story and characters felt so incredibly real. The book is effortlessly funny and heartbreaking at the same time. Dinan is definitely added to my auto-buy author list.

I enjoyed every page of this book. It was hauntingly and beautifully written, with plenty of moments that made me laugh. It's been a while since I've read such realistic, well-crafted characters. I can't wait to explore more of this author's work :)

A trans woman and a cis man enter a relationship that enriches their lives. But can their relationship survive health problems, family drama, and secrets from his past? 

Told from alternating perspectives, this story is rich with emotion and beautiful prose. I loved following Max and Vincent’s stories and their growth together, as well as individually. This is my first reading Dinan’s work, and I absolutely loved it. I will definitely be picking up Dinan’s other novel, Bellies. I appreciated the opportunity to follow a trans protagonist in a story that showed the multiple, complex layers of her outer and inner life. I loved the way Dinan slowly revealed Vincent’s past. The supporting characters felt real and enriched the story. I would highly recommend this to anyone, but particularly fans of Sally Rooney. An easy 5 stars!

I will be posting this review to my Instagram and TikTok on May 27.

Disappoint Me did not *disappoint me*. I went into this book totally blind having not read the author's other work, and I was totally won over by the main character's strong voice. She is observant, witty, and refreshingly self-aware. I did think that Vincent's point-of-view was not wholly necessary or interesting in the same way, which is what knocks this book down from being a perfect five stars for me. Overall, though, I found myself in jaw-dropping appreciation of the way that Nicola Dinan has captured so much about gender, fault, and forgiveness through the relationships in this book, and I would highly recommend it.

3.5 stars

Thank you to the publisher for the ARC!

I really enjoy this story about a trans experience less focused on the transition itself and more on life after. I liked how all of the characters felt so developed and real and like the world was lived in. I just often felt like the narrative dragged on too long. I wish there was more dialogue and shared feelings rather than Maxy’s stream of consciousness. I also felt like the ending was a bit of a letdown — I wanted to feel the conflict fully resolve before it was over. But overall, I enjoyed!

My second 5 star read of the year. It's such a simple duo narrative story, that it holds so much power within. Some character driven novels often forget that plot is still meant to be part of the focus, but this did not disappoint whatsoever and does the C.D. model extremely well. Happy to read more novels from the author!

3.5/5

Disappoint me, by Nicola Dinan, was my first time with the author. What surprised me the most was the beautiful writing, which was probably one of the things that stuck with me the most after reading it.

The novel has dual pov, switching between Max (set in the present) and Vincent’s (set in the past) perspectives. I thoroughly enjoyed how distinct their voices felt and the complexity of each and every character in the narrative. They were far from perfect, yes, but you grew to perhaps not love them, but understand them and their motivations.
For me, this is a story about how (all kinds of) relationships have the potential to help us heal and bring out the best in us, but it is unsustainable to expect them to be a solution to everything we’re struggling with in life and within ourselves.

I did sometimes struggle a bit with the pacing, as well as with a feeling of disconnectedness from the characters, as if watching them from a distance. Nonetheless, I had a very positive experience with Dinan and I am curious to read her previous novel, as the author has a fascinating way to portray human relationships and the subject of queering institutions and futures.

Thank you, NetGalley and Penguin Books, for the ARC copy of the book.

i really enjoyed this novel. the duel perspectives was so important to this novel and i loved that the novel incorporated that! i loved the writing style and the way this author brought the story to life! the characters had so much depth! a story that will sick with me long after the last page.

I truly enjoyed Disappoint Me by Nicola Dinan. It was narrated primarily by Max, a trans woman who is in a relationship with a man who has some history he needs to work through, which is the other timeline present in the narrative. Although the prose is understated, and very literary, I found myself truly enjoying the characters' journeys and wanting to know what happened next.

Max's voice and narration was truly brilliant, I found her voice to be funny, irreverent but extremely thoughtful. The relationships she has with her family and friends are truly led with empathy and love. I wanted to know more about her daily life outside of the events in this book.

I'd recommend this book for fans of literary fiction, primarily a Sally Rooney vibe (in my opinion).

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

I couldn't put this book down. I didn't really know what to expect given I've never read any of Dinan's other work, and to be honest the book's tagline (especially the "trad wife" bit) felt a bit clickbaity given how the story actually happened. But I'm so glad for that because I *loved* this book. The writing was amazing and had me hooked from the beginning, and engaged fully the whole time even with the changing timelines and perspectives. I was expecting a book about messy characters being irresponsible, but instead got a deeply thoughtful and hopeful story about forgiveness. Given the title, I was wondering who would be disappointing who, but it seems like it was everyone, all the time, in ways small and big. No character in this story is flawless, and I also didn't come away hating (almost?) any of them. They're all complicated and I love what the book has to say about change and forgiveness and sticking to our morals.

Thank you to Netgalley and The Dial Press for the chance to read and review this ARC.

I was locked into this book from start to finish. Nicola Dinan does an incredible job of inviting you into a slice of life of two people as they start dating. As their worlds open up to each other and they meet each other's friends and family, we see how their backgrounds impact their relationship. Don't go into this book thinking you'll either love or hate certain characters, instead think of them as incredibly human-- still capable of fucking up, still having to confront their mistakes, and still able to love and be loved.

Told in dual timelines and points-of-views, we follow Max as she's going through a pivotal change in her life and she starts dating Vincent. We also have Vincent in the past on a trip he took to Thailand when he was a young adult and a relationship that changed many aspects of his life.

This book covers difficult topics but also offers nuggets of comedic relief with Max and Vincent's friends and family. Full of conflict and forgiveness, this novel left me pondering how much we are willing to forgive the ones we love for their past mistakes, and more so, do we even have the right to offer that forgiveness?

A queer/lgbt literary fiction (and light romance?) about a trans poet who falls for a corporate lawyer, both carrying their own baggage into their relationship. We alternate POVs, current day poet Max and past lawyer Vincent. Vincent is attracted to trans women but struggles with his sexuality and how others will perceive him.

This had such great conversations about being trans, being trans in a relationship, and on the opposite end being in a relationship with a trans person. I really appreciated that we got Vincent's POV, getting into his head and his insecurities about his attraction to trans women, societal expectations, being perceived as gay, having his straight friends judge him, etc.

I loved the writing and the nuanced characters. Highly recommend for fans of literary fiction / lgbt stories.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance copy for review.

very cool romance/literary work about identity, history, very strong dual narrative and Max was an awesome character. Vincent was slightly less developed but not underdeveloped. 5 stars. tysm for the arc.

I felt like this book was kind of all over the place and not in a fun way! The marketing of “fell down the stairs and woke up a trad wife” isn’t really accurate at all. I enjoyed the shift in perspective between Max and Vincent, but the brain tumor plot seemed to come out of nowhere and it felt disjointed and like there was too much going on.

Thank you for the ARC!!

A rather simple story told beautifully, Disappoint Me is about Max, a transwoman living in London and Vincent, a guy she meets online after some past romantic failures. Told in a dual timeline - the present in London about Max and Vincent’s relationship and the past about Vincent’s gap year in Thailand - the story focuses on relationships between lovers, friends, families, on forgiveness and on how the world still views trans people. It was a good read, I’d definitely recommend it.